Overview This series of workshops is designed to address three major issues surrounding teaching and learning in modern languages, namely:

how to deliver lessons that stimulate, engage and motivate pupils, instilling a curiosity about and love for language learning.

how to develop the skills, competences, attitudes and attributes of successful language learning from an early age, and

how to create “meanings that matter” in a language curriculum that has historically been driven by a range of fairly sterile topics

There will be a mixture of input, group discussion and activities, and delegates will be able to take from the workshop not only ready-to-use resources, but also the knowledge to enable them to plan and devise a curriculum which will establish a secure foundation for future language learning.

Workshop Facilitator

A double graduate in Spanish and Latin American Studies, John Connor taught languages in inner city comprehensive schools in the North East of England and the Midlands, holding Head of Faculty posts before serving for 3 years as Adviser for Languages to a local authority.

He has worked as a commissioning editor for a publishing house, and was a Team Inspector with OFSTED and an Assessor on the Advanced Skills Teacher programme for the Department for Education. He has also worked as a senior examiner with two major awarding bodies.

Since 1997 he has worked freelance, writing teaching materials in French and Spanish at all levels, running training seminars for language teachers, directing in-house staff development and conducting teaching and learning quality audits for modern language departments and schools across the UK, the Channel Islands, Europe, the Middle East and the Far East.

As a consultant he helped several local authorities develop their Primary Languages programmes, conducting methodology training and language up-skilling sessions for non-specialist primary teachers.

Workshop 1 - Outstanding MFL Lessons

This workshop will:

Consider the characteristics of outstanding MFL lessons in terms of planning, expectations, teacher expertise and assessment.

Examine how to develop higher order thinking skills in language lessons and consider the role of Assessment for Learning in improving pupil outcomes.

Explore how the use of new technologies can enhance language learning.

This workshop is concerned with laying the foundations of good habits of language learning which will stand pupils in good stead as they advance through their years of schooling. It is based on the concepts of the Framework for Languages produced in the UK for 7-11 year old pupils, and will examine the 5 strands of the Framework, namely:

Oracy (O)

Literacy (L)

Intercultural Understanding (IU)

Knowledge About Language (KAL)

Language Learning Strategies (LLS)

It will also consider practical approaches to key issues such as developing the phoneme/ grapheme relationship, active learning, integrating languages into the wider curriculum, assessing pupils’ progress and the transition to the next phase of education.

Agenda

0900

Arrival and registration

0930

Welcome and introduction

0940

The 5 Strands of the Languages Framework – activities and discussion

1100

Coffee

1120

Laying the foundations – the phoneme/grapheme relationship

Making learning active; languages across the curriculum - activities

1245

Lunch

1345

Assessing pupils’ progress – what does progress look like? What evidence can we gather? Activities and discussion

1430

Transition to the next phase – what information do we need to collect, and how to pass it on. The 5 Bridges model

1530

Evaluation and close

Workshop 3 - Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL)

CLIL is an approach or method which integrates the teaching of content from a curriculum subject with the teaching of a non-native language.

It’s considered increasingly important in our global society because knowledge of another language helps learners to develop skills in their first language and also help them to develop skills to communicate ideas about science, arts and technologies to people around the world.

In a CLIL classroom, the curricular subject and new language skills are taught together; and thinking and learning skills are integrated too. CLIL teachers can be subject teachers, language teachers or classroom assistants. Different teachers have different goals that can be achieved through a high degree of cooperation, among them: language teachers need to learn more about subject content and subject teachers need to learn about the language needed for their subjects.

The workshop will start by exploring the core features of CLIL methodology, and then go to examine lesson planning, a framework for CLIL lessons, how to exploit texts, deal with vocabulary, check understanding, correct errors and develop presentation skills in a climate of constructive critique.

Delegates will take from the workshop not only examples of ready-to-use resources, but also the skills and knowledge to begin framing a CLIL-based approach to their own lessons.

Step 1: Fill out the Workshop Reservation Form (below) by January 12, 2015.Step 2: Our office will send you/your coordinating staff the invoice upon receipt of the form.Step 3: You/your coordinating staff will submit the Payment Completion Form after making the payment